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Saturday, July 03, 2010

Vuvuzela!

I've won a vuvuzela! During the Soccer World Cup, our local grocery chain is running a lottery where one gets scratchcards for shopping. On one of the cards, I've scratched off exactly four vuvuzela icons, meaning I now own this wonderful plastic horn, just in time for this afternoon's quarter finals of Germany vs. Argentina.

It neatly comes in the German colours, and with all necessary assembly and safety instructions (120 dB or so in front of the horn can be dangerous...)

As this is a physics blog, you may expect me to say something about the physics of the vuvuzela, but it is too hot today, and I have to prepare for the match.

Besides, there are already great blog posts on the vuvuzela, for example atScience 2.0, where it is explained that all horns work the same way. You blow into them and that creates a vibrating column of air but the construction of the horn means certain resonant frequencies will occur, or at A quantum of knowledge. And the New Scientist has a nice interview with Trevor Cox, president of the UK Institute of Acoustics, on the sound of the vuvuzela.

15 comments:

So you have one of those most annoying instruments, which has forced me to turn the sound down while wat6ching the games. I think you should take it to the local pub and use it while watching the match as I think it might be a good experiment in exploring the effects of “Backreaction”:-) I also have wondered if those plastic ones actually sound like the original that are fashioned from an antelope’s horn.

I’ve watched several of the matches and will be watching Germany vs Argentina, which is coming up in a little more than an hour. It was sad to see Brazil go down in defeat yesterday. yet with the Netherlands winning it will assure at least one European team will be in the final; well at least from the way I have it figured. I really like the German team yet despite their talent many are very young and thus I hope they can hold their composer against Madona’s squad, especially with him attempting to stir the pot a bit with his innuendo or as it’s now called “trash talk”. I think it will be a hard fought game with Argentina now holding the torch for South American hopes making it all that more intense, so I expect to see a few of those yellow and red tickets being seen. The only problem is for me 9:00 am is a bit too early to crack open a beer:-)

http://www.ajudaica.com/category/128/Shofar/ http://www.amazon.com/Lark-in-the-Morning-Yemenite/dp/B0002CSB8E http://www.ajudaica.com/item/4033_311/Shofar+Odor+Neutralizer+Spray Every obeisance has its sacrificies.

Jewish law forbids Sabbath shofar sounding. The ba’al tekiyah might carry it - a class of forbidden Sabbath work. If a non-believer carries it without being so instructed, and does not touch it while doing so, you've got a loophole.

A conch shell plus a topless Pacific Islander babe (or local quantum mechanician) is a viable alternative. A partially echoplexed Indian conch created the extraterrestrial sound of the derelict outworlder spacecraft in Alien.

Zephir, they probably like the publicity but be careful when hosting materials by outsiders at your own web site. Make sure you have permission if needed, and my apologies if taking care of that is obvious to you and didn't need noting.

Those manufacturers of the wuzuvelas should praise/sell some hearing protection. Ideal: every second spectator has a wuzuvela, the other 50 % use the protection.That's business like the old "Oil for Chinas lamps" when Standard Oil gave free clay lamps to the Chinese. :=)RegardsGeorg